Category: Clothing

I was going to cool it on the sock posts for a while. I didn’t want to bore anyone who might eventually read these posts. But I made the best sock yet and I’m excited about it, so I thought I’d show the internets.

I wore them yesterday and they fit perfectly. The stretch over the day was minimal and they still were snuggly pressed to my ankles when I took them off last night. I think that’s because this is wool and I’ve mostly dealt with cotton/nylon mixes.

I think they also look great. That has nothing to do with me though, I just splurged on some pricey yarn. This is Feza Yarns Uneek 3008, or as I call it, “Bumblebee Massacre.” Unfortunately, I think this line of yarns has been discontinued but you can still find it on etsy and in some yarn shops for $20-30. I think I got this one for $25. Which, is more than I’d normally spend on my basic looking socks, but it looked so interesting on the shelf I couldn’t resist.

A month or so ago I signed up for yarnbox and I received my first shipment a few days ago. What attracted me to the service was that it sent me yarn (yassss!) and second, they had a sock box (double yassss!). I also hoped it would be a great way to get the yarn I either wouldn’t normally get for myself or get yarn that isn’t available to me locally.

This month’s “box” was a generous 434-yard skein of Corrie Sock yarn from Flying Goat Farm. I say “box” because it was really one of those gray bags that many magazines are sent in. Most box services I see are done really cute and presented well, but this was very much just yarn in a bag.

The yarn itself is not something I would normally buy, which made this even more interesting. I have nothing against it, but this is not something I would consider my style. So, I guess I got exactly what I was hoping for! I also wouldn’t buy this because it’s $28 and I’m more of a $5/pair of socks type of guy. My socks are for utility and allergy relief, not beauty, though I do like when they end up looking unexpectedly nice. Since the sock box is about $20/month and this is a $28 skein, I think it’s still a deal.

I also noted that the yarn was noticeably thicker than any sock yarn I’ve used, so machine knitting could be problematic but I was sure I’d get through it. I’d just be pushing the limits of my 72 needle setup.

I cranked away at the sock machine with only a few issues and I was pretty happy with what I saw being knit:

I was surprised how the striping came out and now I’m even more glad I ordered sock box. I definitely never would have picked this skein up off a shelf or internet store, but now that I have the sock in hand I can say I’d totally wear it… and I will. Tomorrow, most likely.

One thing you may not know about tie-dye is that once you mix it, you should use it all up within the hour. According to the instructions, it will become less effective as time goes on. I didn’t realize that until further into dyeing yarns, so I went and grabbed a shirt and used up my dye. I’m glad I did, I really like the how it came out!

For my next round of dying, I had a friend over and we tie-dyed some shirts. As we each took turns dyeing, the other would look through Pinterest and figure out what to try next. We had stopped off at the store earlier in the day and I grabbed some XL t-shirts to use as giveaways. He, on the other hand, made shirts for himself. Selfish, I know!

I ended up making 3 giveaways:

I stuck mostly to spirals. My friend seemed to enjoy rectangular and striped designs more. Here’s some of his:

I plan on dying more yarns (since I have so many undyed skeins), so I’m sure more dye projects will be popping up soon.

Yesterday, when I got up and got ready for work, I popped on my new jelly bean socks as I had planned. I was surprised just how loose the ribbing was. It stretches and lays flush with the ankle, but it really had no strength to it. It wasn’t squeezing around the ankle like a commercial sock would. But then, my ribbing has no elastic woven into it like a commercial sock would either.

By the end of the day, it was just as stretched out as my non-ribbed sock was. And to be honest, I didn’t care for how the ribbing looked once it was on my foot and stretched.

I can see how ribbing could be useful for a smaller ankle. But my ankle is quite large and it doesn’t seem to make any difference unless I decided to start putting elastic in my sock… which I won’t, because I’m allergic to it, hence the reason I’m making my own socks to begin with.

I could also see myself using ribbing if I was making socks for someone else, they do look more polished and commercial if you add ribbing. But for me, the amount of work and time that goes into adding ribbing is not worth it. I think my future socks will just have a plain hung hem (like the bottom sock in the picture).

I may play with adding elastic just to see how well it works out and for any socks I make as gifts.

Last night, I was so excited when I finally got through a ribbed cuff on the knitting machine. Until now, I kept dropping stitches. The way the ribber attachment is placed on the machine blocks the view of the sock until you remove it. By then, you’re usually pretty far into the sock and it’s so disappointing when you find it didn’t turn out and you’ll have to manually fix it. But, I took my time and watch every dang needle grab at the yarn trying to figure out why I kept dropping stitches. It was painful and slow, but I got through the whole ribbing section without any issues. So maybe I just need to go very slow. In case you were wondering this yarn is Red Heart’s heart & sole – jelly beans. For lunch today, I stitched up the toes and hid all the loose ends. Tomorrow, I will have some jelly bean colored socks on my feet and I’ll get to test how much of a difference the ribbing makes. The colors aren’t really my style, but they’re the first with ribbing at the ankle, so I’m wearing them! Just visually comparing the two styles of a hung hem and a ribbed hem you can see a pretty big difference. I know it’s hard to tell from the photo but that’s about a 2″ difference. The bottom one is about the actual size of my ankle, so the ribbed one should grip on pretty well. But then again, I’m comparing two different yarns, which by the size of the stitches look to be pretty different…. so who knows. Once I get some more practice in on these hems I’ll be moving on to the next item on my checklist: rounding out the heels and toes better. I’ve been watching YouTube videos on it and it looks pretty simple, so hopefully, that goes quickly and easily.

My first round of socks have all been sewn up and I’m starting to wear them. I’ve noticed a few things:

First, they are super cute.

Second, they are so soft and stretchy.

Third, it will take some time to get used to the texture on the bottom of my foot. Because I’m using sock yarn, and not a lace weight yarn, each loop is noticeably bigger and you can feel that on your foot when you walk. It’s not uncomfortable in any way, but you will notice the difference from a commercial sock as you wear them.

As I wear them I am slowly creating a list of changes and things to learn as I make each future sock. A few of the future changes will be:

Change hung hem to a ribbed hung hem

Round out the toes and heels better

Try lace weight

Last night, I started playing around with the first one and started setting up the ribber attachment. I got a lot of extras with my machine so I’ll be slowly trying and playing with each thing until I get my ideal sock. Getting the ribber set up was a chore, but once everything was aligned and screwed down it was pretty simple. It was, however, very slow and tedious to remove and replace needles all for 30 rows of a cuff. I know I’ll get fast at it, but it seems like a very big pain in the butt for such a small section of each sock. But I got it working and the ribbing does seem like something I will want on my future socks.

Every year I usually buy myself some crazy expensive gift for my birthday. Some years I go a little crazier than others and this year I think I kept it pretty tame.

I have been looking at sock machines for years on eBay. But the price point for something like a 70-year-old machine with no support (especially if you have no idea how to use one) is pretty high.

A few weeks ago I came across a post the Erlbacher Gearhart has started reproducing their old machines. So I jumped on it and got their new speedster model with a bunch of goodies to go with. I was emailing back and forth with them for a while before purchasing making sure I would have everything I needed to hit the ground running when it arrived.

Two days before my birthday, a small wood box arrived with everything screwed down inside. I was surprised that it actually came with tools (like, real tools, not cheap things you’ll throw away), a spool of scrap yarn, a picture of the box (which I assume is there to help you put it all back in if you decide to put it away), a starting bonnet and a bunch of other stuff.

I had already done some yarn shopping before it arrived and watched a bunch of YouTube videos so I pretty much instantly started pumping out socks as soon as I put it all together.

There are still some manual and tedious things to do in sock making even with a fancy machine like this. Hanging yarn on the little hooks isn’t my favorite thing in the world, but now that I’ve done it a few times I am getting pretty quick at it. And I find sewing up toes with the dreaded Kitchener stitch actually pretty relaxing.

But ask yourself how long would it take you to knit a sock? Hours? Several evenings? As a beginner it’s probably taking me about 45 minutes with this machine and that is taking my sweet time and learning as I go. There are videos of people easily making a sock in 8 minutes. Isn’t that crazy!?

And watching it work is pretty mesmerizing even if you’re making a boring grey sock…